Month: August 2005

Technorati Blues

technorati-784323I am very excited about the potential of Technorati. Technorati indexes weblogs. Recall that weblogs are much more than just some dude‘s online diary. Weblogs (or blogs, for short) are a new publishing mechanism that allows a lot more people to publish content to the internet more easily. The point being that just because you have no desire to read someone’s diary, don’t write off blogs as a source for great, real-time information. Check out the blogs listed on the left hand side of The Home Place for blogs that I read daily.

First the good news: I use Technorati for two purposes right now. To search for content on topics that interest me. For example I use it to look for people who are writing articles about camping. Right now there are almost 200,000 posts about camping (alas, none of my articles are there- more on that below). I also use it to see what other authors are mentioning Newsome.Org in their articles. For example, here is a post on a German blog that mentions this site.

The problem that is driving me nuts is that I want to use it for a third purpose: to allow readers to find my articles and posts via a keyword search, just like I did above with camping. Unfortunately, my site is not being indexed by Technorati. Not because Technorati doesn’t want to, but because of some technical problem that I cannot seem to overcome. Technorati is run by smart people, but like any new service, its support staff is stretched thin. I wrote about the problem, which is shared by others, including Improbulus, as detailed in this post. I got a friendly response a few days later, suggesting that I try to fix a horde of XHTML errors on my page. Without going into a lot a technical detail, my page, while reasonably compliant with most standards, does not comply with the stricter syntax of this newer markup language. There is nothing wrong with that advice, at least as a first try. Here’s the rub: I can’t create compliance without dumping the new look and feel of this site, and there are lots of other sites with more compliance issues than this one (i.e., that have more XHTML errors than I do) that do get indexed by Technorati.

So I have a hobson’s choice: dump the new look and feel in favor of a simpler look that would be more compliant and might get indexed or leave things the way they are and run the risk of never getting indexed.

I have written back to Technorati to show them other (less compliant) pages that are getting indexed and asking if there is another way to solve the problem.

I hope so. Technorati is a great idea, but if I’m not getting indexed, you can be sure there are a lot of others who aren’t either. And that’s a lot of content to leave on the table (or out of the database, as the case may be).

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Another Fun Camping Trip

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We just got back from another fun camping trip. This time the Newsomes, the Clarks, the LeFevers and the Veldmans went to Concan, Texas and stayed at Frio Country. Frio Country in is the Texas Hill Country, surrounded by rolling hills, forests and the Frio River.

We spent a lot of time on the river, swimming and tubing. On Monday, we went on a 2.5 hour trip down the river. The kids had a blast, and the adults did too. It was a ton of fun.

We also fished on the river and caught quite a few fish. Cassidy caught her third fish all-time (a little perch), and her first one all by herself. She also caught 3 frogs and spotted a jackrabbit and a skunk near our cabin.

Delaney was the youngest one to go tubing and she was a champ. She had fun, was brave on the rapids and never fell out of her tube.

It was a great trip and the group has already made plans to go back next summer. In the meantime, we’ll look forward to our next trip this October. It will be cooler by then and we can begin our tent camping season. There’s nothing more fun than camping with your family and friends. We are blessed to be a part of such a fun group.

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Jukebox, Uncensored

You know the drill. Open up your jukebox of choice, point the shuffle feature to your entire library of songs and list, without exception, the first 10 or so songs that play.

Storybook Endings – BR5-49 (Big Backyard Beat Show)
Canray’s Contredanse – Beausoleil (Hot Chili Mama)
The Rose of San Joaquin – Tom Russell (The Rose of San Joaquin)
Your Sweet Lovin’ – Margie Joseph (Stax Set)
My Hometown – Bruce Springsteen (Live 1975-85)
When I’m at Your House – Loudon Wainwright III (History)
Ain’t We Funky Now – Brothers Johnson (Blam!!)
Don’t Let Me Down Again – Rusty Weir (Stacked Deck)
Vulcan Death Grip – Ugly Americans (Stereophonic Spanish Fly)
Beggar’s Will – Steve Pride (Haint)

MDA Lock-Up

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Next Thursday police officers will come to my office, arrest me and take me to jail. I am part of the MDA Lock-Up, a fund raising effort of the Muscular Dystrophy Association.

It’s a good cause and I am happy to support it. If you’d like to help bail me out, and support the MDA’s efforts to find a cure, please visit my Bail Page.

Somebody Noticed the Elephant

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USA Today (via Yahoo) published an article today that addresses the number one reason why podcasts will never be (or, more accurately, allowed to become) a mainstram thing. It’s about time someone noticed that elephant in the room (the priority-challenged RIAA). If podcasting is ever going to attract the masses, it must contain interesting, legal content, that you can’t easily get somewhere else. For that to happen, the elephant must be dealt with. Otherwise, podcasting will devolve into three catagories:

1) Watered down, low bitrate marketing ploys from the record label cartel;

2) Rebel podcasts that try to stay one step ahead of the RIAA lawyers (like the file sharing services do now); and

3) A lot of mostly boring talk with a few public domain songs thrown in to give it an NPR vibe.

None of those are likely to bring podcasting to the masses.

So until the elephant is dealt with, podcasting is hobbled almost to the point of uselessness. Yes, yes, I know there are some good podcasts out there, but that’s only because they ignore the elephant and use unlicensed music, but that will soon end, if you read between the lines of this quote from the article:

“Record companies say they’re just trying to look out for their artists. Podcasting could exacerbate the piracy problem created by file-swapping sites such as Grokster and Kazaa. When listeners download a podcast, they “are getting a copy of an entire program … an unprotected copy that they can do whatever they want with,” says Steve Marks, a lawyer at the Recording Industry Association of America.”

The RIAA doesn’t yet know what it wants to do “about” podcasting. Poscasting’s not terribly popular yet and even the RIAA (surely) has some residual desire not to be painted as the devil (probably, I am assuming, maybe not). But the record cartel also knows that if this thing gets legs, it could be Napster all over again. Eventually, greed will beat out logic and more lawsuits will be filed against 10 year olds aimed at stopping podcasting in its tracks. The prime objective of the RIAA will be to avoid another Napster at all costs.

To survive podcasters have to confront the elephant. Ignore it and it will eventually charge at you with tusks (and lawyers) raised and ready.

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New Rancho Radio Set

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For the second week in a row, I picked the songs for this week’s playlist at random from our alt. country library. Last week, I was really pleased with the mix. I heard a bunch of good cuts that I wouldn’t have thought to add had I done the set manually. I also received a good bit of positive feedback from listeners. So, once again, a new random set from our 26,000 song library.

Whatever's on My Mind

Interesting conversation over at Thomas Hawk‘s page regarding Scoblegate. I think a lot of Robert and I hope and expect him to prevail in what is now a cyber-spat, but may turn into something more.

We had dinner tonight (as we do most Tuesday nights) with the Veldmans at Pico’s. Very good crab quesadillas there. The dining guides say it has live music Wed.-Sun. I’ve been there a bunch, but haven’t noticed any music. I need to look closer next time we go on the weekend. Good discussion tonight about Iraq, politics, etc. I used to be considered somewhat liberal, but Sharon makes me sound like a fascist. I’d rather talk to someone who thinks my political views are insane than someone who agrees with me on every issue, and Sharon fits that bill. She thinks I (and everyone else who isn’t a rabid democrat) am nuts. At one point Ray got frustrated trying to argue with his wife and started arguing his point to Raina. That is called preaching to the choir.

Andy and Floyd got all mad at me at work today, saying I am difficult and don’t keep confidences. I told them I appreciate the heads up and that I would not tell anyone they think that.

And a school teacher shall lead them…. Battlestar Galactica continues to move up my list of all-time favorite shows. The scene this past week outside President Roslin’s cell blew me away. The writing on that show is truly amazing.

Fred Wilson has a good read about blogging. He is a really good writer. He also turned me onto Josh Rouse, who has some great songs (Dressed Up Like Nebraska being the best) on some good records.